Rawr's "rotation" determination is pretty simple. Here's a simplified version from what I recall last time I looked at it in detail how it works (maybe some minor changes since then but looked similar).

1. Take the duration of the fight determine how much energy that is
2. Determine how much energy & combo points is needed for Savage Roar 100% of the time subtract that from energy total and combo point total
3. Determine how much energy & combo points is needed for Rip 100% of the time subtract that from energy total and combo point total
4. Subtract energy usage for Rake up 100% of time and add in combo points for Rake up 100% of time
5. With left over energy & OOC procs all go into your combo point generator (shred) so add the combo points generated to the total.
6. Left over combo points all get dumped into FB.

Its a little more complex to make sure you aren't ripping if you don't have enough combo points, taking into account FB having energy to be used, etc but that is pretty much the gist of how it works. It's fairly simple and models everything works as it should on average and no wasting of combo points. Btw I've seen up to 7.8k DPS when my RNG lines up perfectly and a little luck on clearcasting procs but its normally a lot less than the theoretical 7.6k DPS Rawr predicts I should have.

Look at our complex stats.

Avoided Attacks -> You have 2% more chance to hit (Lot more expertise rating, little less Hit rating), this should favor ArPen over Agi.

Crit Chance -> About the same. I've got little more Crit Rating but little less Agi

Attack Speed How come you're attacking faster with less Haste rating? Have you checked bloodlust? (I didn't)


Now, I was wondering why our relative stats tables look so very different. Even when I loaded your char into my RAWR, I've got your result of ArPen being at such incredibly high value.

I got three ideas:

a) Could it be, that the T8 2-Piece Bonus leads to high ArPen Values? Because the clearcast Procs should be used for shred and shred is basically the attack, that benefits more from ArPen, than from Agi.

b) Maybe the value of Agi and ArPen changes, when the percentages of our attacks change? Like - When I do more % of my damage with bleed attacks, then Agi will become better and when more % of my damage comes from shred and melee, ArPen gets better.

c) Maybe at certain Crit Levels RAWR's math calculates more Ferocious Bites. For example, if you have 54,4% Crit RAWR estimates one FB every 4 Cycles and when you get to 54,5%, then suddenly it's one FB every 3 Cycles. More FB -> higher ArPen Value compared to Agility.


These are 3 possible explanations for the differences of the ArPen <-> Agi Values we see.



*edit*: Actually, my third idea, c), is what Allev said. He just expressed it a lot better, than I did with my poor english.

I created last week my than current DPS set in a char planner to get the input values for Toskk to get input real world values to input (Rawr was not available) chardev.org v6 ~ a World of Warcraft character planner

When using cat form values in Toskk's calc and adjusting the ArPen value the crossover comes at 398 ArPen with Rip Idol and 312 with shred idol. In my current real world gear I am at 97 ArPen, when replacing Agi Gems with ArPen Gems I reach 225, which is within the ballpark for swapping to ArPen.
chardev.org v6 ~ a World of Warcraft character planner

The results these values create in Toskk are not so promising:
Agi:AP = 2.4236
Armor Pen. Rating:AP = 2.306

The crossover with shred Idol is with these values at 350 and 436 with Rip Idol.

So my real DPS set is well behind the switch curve. If anybody has a better suggestion to narrow it down I am happy to do it. Rawr is not always available to me so this was the closest solution to see were I am.

Edit: I ran Toskk's with FB every 2nd cycle.

Yeah, I had bloodlust checked didn't realize you didn't (though when I loaded your character it had pretty much the same per stat values as you showed).

There's currently a bug in Rawr involving rounding issues on the relative stat values page according to this thread. You can tweak some very minor buffs to get it to tell you crazy things like haste being your best stat. Overall ratings on actual pieces of gear are supposed to still be accurate, but I've seen the gem page and the relative stats page suggest two different (both incorrect) stat priorities.

It looks like you missed the new Algalon quest rewards. The 25-man version is definitely BiS. The 10-man one is probably also 2nd best, though it's close.

http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/...alon25-man.jpg
http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/...alon10-man.jpg

Edit: I'm seeing new BiS something similar to:

Head	Conqueror's Nightsong Headguard
Neck	Pendulum of Infinity
Shoulders	Conqueror's Nightsong Shoulderpads
Chest	Embrace of the Gladiator
Waist	Soul-Devouring Cinch
Legs	Conqueror's Nightsong Legguards
Feet	Footpads of Silence
Wrist	Mechanist's Bindings
Hands	Conqueror's Nightsong Handgrips
Finger1	Brann's Signet Ring
Finger2	Brann's Sealing Ring
Trinket1	Grim Toll
Trinket2	Mjolnir Runestone
Back	Drape of Icy Intent
MainHand	Dark Edge of Depravity

When I play with it, I'm getting a lot more oomph by taking 2pT7 and 2pT8 over 4pT8, but that may be simply because 4pT8 isn't modeled correctly yet. Still, I'd expect a fair amount of DPS from staying with some of the 'good' T7 (I suspect chest and shoulders) to get that rip uptime.

I think I may have found the discrepancy from rawr to this (at least in part). Rawr is starting with a boss armor of 13k, you're starting with more like 10.5k. Is it possible this is the problem or is it just because you guys might do the math differently?

Hey Lolaan, good to see you're still active. Are you using the newest version of Rawr? It should be using the new armor value also.

I am, I figured out the problem once you said that. I've been using my file from past versions and it still remembers the old armor number. This could be other's problem as well if they're using old data files.

I've been following this thread for many weeks now, and am using your simulator NC. I'm very impressed with the numbers I'm pulling and the dialogue in these posts. Thanks NC and everyone. I do have a question on gemming the recommended gear. While working up to the Ulduar gear, I'll use the Valorous Dreamwalker Headguard, and so I gem it with the:

Relentless Earthsiege Diamond...

Requires at least 1 Red gems
Requires at least 1 Yellow gems
Requires at least 1 Blue gems

...I can accomodate the Red requirement, but what will the Yellow and Blue be? Where will they go?

First of all. I'm not dead.
I had a small break for Italian's holidays and I'm now working hard on both simulator and addon.

I'm not going to put new release soons because I'm going to make some major changes in both and so you will see 2 major release:

some anticipation (in braket you will see somthing I'm going to implement but I don't know if I'll do them in time for the next release):

Simulator:

- A recompute of best in slot gear
- Change fix: now physical vulnerability debuff is 4% instead of 2%
- Fixed the cycle for boss kill (if the boss is going to be killed you'll not use rip/rake).
- Added profession bonus (min/max is BS+JC)
- A better implementation for Grim Toll

With those 4 changes alone the dps in pre-Ulduar gear goes up to 7050 dps.

(Trinket implementation)

I'm also revaluting rake usage for energy micromanagement.

A better implementation of movement fights.


Addon:

Interface:
Hud:
I've redisigned the hud, now it has a better appearence.
Added boss health and boss power bar to the hud
Added text to the hud (% life, total life, mana, etc..)
Added casting bar to the hud (over the power bar).
Cooldown monitor:
You will be able to choce bear/cat cd monitor, put it vertically or horizontally or using scrolling bars instead of icons. You will have different frames where you can put the ability to monitor.
Fonts & Co:
(You can now choce fonts, texture, etc.. for the different frames. )

Stats Frame:
( I'll add a different stats frame with defensive stats (good for tanking). )

Bug Fix:
I'll add support for Dranei Aura
I'm looking at energy micromanage for rake

Cycle:
Ulduar boss mod support (the cycle will change depending on the boss)
Boss Kill mode (the cycle will change at target low hp)

Profile:
(I'm going to add profiles support)



As for rake energy micromanage, I'm the only one with the feeling that FBN cycle waits to much before showing rake in some situations?

@nightcrowler: I've noticed that, about rake. Sometimes it likes to wait a little longer than it should if I have rip/mangle/SR up and running. Othertimes, it will suggest I use rake when rip wears off, I have Mangle/SR up, and I have 5 cp. :\

First results about trinkets for feral dps:

while Noble Deck Greatness: Agility if averaged out stay about the same value, Grim Toll lose it's value because Arpen stacks with itself.

Agility Deck: 148 dps equivalent to 106 agility (instead of the averaged out value of 102 agility).
Grim Toll: 233 dps equivalent to 160 Arpen (instead of the averaged out of 133 Arpen).

Grim Toll is better than Agility, this also mean that the BiS Ulduar trinkets are double ArPen trinkets (that's cool, I've just avoided spending 14k gold for Agility Deck..)

Oh yeah you're right. Old files still have the 13k armor, new ones use the 10k armor.

Actually I was not aware, that they changed the armor of bosses.

But still I need about 600 ArPen for ArPen to become equal to Agi. And Rip idol is always better...

I've updated the main post with the latest Ulduar news, I've also fixed physical vulnerability debuff, added a "kill time" cycle (you don't want to use rip if the boss is going to die in 2 seconds..) and some little improvement to the other abilities usage.


In the following report I've assumed 100% mangle debuff uptime (manglebot) and 100% bleed effect (if you have a manglebot it's likely that there is a bleed on the target).

CAT SIM report:

5 minute fights.
100,000 Simulations.
Time step: 0.01 seconds.
Latency: 90ms.

Pre-Ulduar BiS Gear


Aggressive Stats after all the buffs (full stacked raid + Bloodlust used 1 time in a 5 min fight)
_______________________

Cat (crit% vs. a boss (-4.8% added)): 48.74%
Cat (AP): 10538
Expertise: 23
Hit: 7.65%
Armor Penetration: 47.1%
Haste (from equipment): 12.7%
+weapon damage: 0

Boss base Armor (before penetration and debuff): 10643
Boss modified Armor (after penetration and debuff): 4428
Boss Damage Reduction (after debuff and penetration): 22.5%
Weapon Speed Reduction % (Total without Bloodlust): 28%
Missed % (Total): 0.35%
Dodged %: 0.55%
_____________________________________

DPS: 7025 +/- 0.7, (Min-Max variance: 28%, Lower dps sample: 6081, Upper dps sample: 8069, 100k fights)
TPS: 4988

White cat: 2209, Yellow cat: 4816
White: 31.5%
Shred: 32.1%, Avg dmg: 8617, #/cycle: 7.10),
RIP: 19.7%, Avg dmg: 43041, #/cycle: 0.87)
Rake: 11.3%, Avg dmg: 8611, #/cycle: 2.50),
Ferocious Bite: 5.5%, Avg dmg: 14686, #/cycle: 0.71, Average Energy Usage: 38)
Savage Roar uptime: 98.3%
Average Cycle Time: 27.1 sec.
_____________________________________


Stats value

Stat	points		Error	dps value		Error
Armor Pen	27.1	+/-	0.1	1.49	+/-	0.01
Agility	25.9	+/-	0.1	1.42	+/-	0.01
Feral AP	12.0	+/-	0.1	0.66	+/-	0.01
Strengh	23.8	+/-	0.1	1.31	+/-	0.01
Crit	21.4	+/-	0.1	1.18	+/-	0.01
Hit	21.4	+/-	0.1	1.17	+/-	0.01
Expertise	21.2	+/-	0.1	1.17	+/-	0.01
Haste	19.7	+/-	0.1	1.08	+/-	0.01
AP	10.0	+/-	0.1	0.55	+/-	0.01

Best in slot gear (pre Ulduar, 3.1 rules)

Slot	Item
Head	Valorous Dreamwalker Headguard
Neck	Favor of the Dragon Queen
Shoulders	Valorous Dreamwalker Shoulderpads
Chest	Chestguard of the Recluse
Waist	Stalk-Skin Belt
Legs	Leggings of the Honored
Feet	Footwraps of Vile Deceit
Wrist	Wristwraps of the Cutthroat
Hands	Frosted Adroit Handguards
Finger1	Surge Needle Ring
Finger2	Greatring of Collision
Trinket1	Grim Toll
Trinket2	Darkmoon Card: Greatness (agility)
Back	Drape of the Deadly Foe
MainHand	Journey's End + berserking
Idol	Idol of the Ravenous Beast
ExtraWaistSocket	Fractured Scarlet Ruby

The stats value are evaluated by subtraction, so if you are in naxx10, heroic gear, look at naxx25 table, if you are in BiS pre-Ulduar gear, look at Ulduar table

You can found dps value of all stats and item rankin here:
Gear Ranking

If you click on a number in the "score" collumn you will se an integer value, that value is exactly the dps value of that piece of gear


Ulduar BiS Gear

The following simulation is made with Ulduar best in slot gear. Actually PvP weapon is better but I don't like the idea of putting a PvP weapon in a PvE gear list.

Stats value

Stat	points		Error	dps value		Error
Armor Pen	32.9	+/-	0.1	2.01	+/-	0.01
Agility	25.0	+/-	0.1	1.53	+/-	0.01
Feral AP	12.0	+/-	0.1	0.73	+/-	0.01
Strengh	23.8	+/-	0.1	1.46	+/-	0.01
Crit	20.0	+/-	0.1	1.23	+/-	0.01
Hit	22.8	+/-	0.1	1.40	+/-	0.01
Expertise	22.8	+/-	0.1	1.40	+/-	0.01
Haste	19.6	+/-	0.1	1.20	+/-	0.01
AP	10.0	+/-	0.1	0.61	+/-	0.01

Slot	Item
Head	Conqueror's Nightsong Headguard
Neck	Seed of Budding Carnage
Shoulders	Conqueror's Nightsong Shoulderpads
Chest	Winter's Icy Embrace
Waist	Relic Hunter's Cord
Legs	Conqueror's Nightsong Legguards
Feet	Footpads of Silence
Wrist	Mechanist's Bindings
Hands	Conqueror's Nightsong Handgrips
Finger1	Loop of the Agile
Finger2	Cindershard Ring
Trinket1	Grim Toll
Trinket2	Mjolnir Runestone
Back	Drape of Faceless General
MainHand	Lotrafen, Spear of the Damned + berserking
Idol	Idol of the Ravenous Beast
ExtraWaistSocket	Fractured Scarlet Ruby

Simulation

Aggressive Stats after all the buffs (full stacked raid + Bloodlust used 1 time in a 5 min fight)
_______________________

Cat (crit% vs. a boss (-4.8% added)): 54.57%
Cat (AP): 10464
Expertise: 22
Hit: 8.1%
Armor Penetration: 83.2%
Haste (from equipment): 6.3%
+weapon damage: 0



Boss base Armor (before penetration and debuff): 10643
Boss modified Armor (after penetration and debuff): 1619
Boss Damage Reduction (after debuff and penetration): 9.6%
Weapon Speed Reduction % (Total without Bloodlust): 24%
Missed % (Total): 0%
Dodged %: 0.8%
_____________________________________


DPS: 7892 +/- 0.7, (Min-Max variance: 27%, Lower dps sample: 6813, Upper dps sample: 8950, 100k fights)
TPS: 5603

White cat: 2479, Yellow cat: 5413
White: 31.4% (SR: 0%)
Shred: 34.5%, Avg dmg: 10233, #/cycle: 8.9),
RIP: 17.3%, Avg dmg: 37450, #/cycle: 1.2)
Rake: 10.1%, Avg dmg: 8594, #/cycle: 3.0),
Ferocious Bite: 6.7%, Avg dmg: 17295, #/cycle: 1.0, Average Energy Usage: 38)
Savage Roar uptime: 98.1%
Average Cycle Time: 33.4 sec.

The stats value are evaluated by subtraction, so if you are in naxx10, heroic gear, look at naxx25 table, if you are in BiS pre-Ulduar gear, look at Ulduar table

You can found dps value of all stats and item rankin here:
Gear Ranking

If you click on a number in the "score" collumn you will se an integer value, that value is exactly the dps value of that piece of gear

FAQ

What is the standard cycle? There isn't. Since 3.0 druids have a priority list.
What is a priority list? Basically depending uppon dots counter and other ability for each istant you have a "better ability" to use.
Is always better to RIP at 5 cp, also if I have 4 CPs already Yes.
Is always better to Ferocious Bite at 5 cp, also if I have 4 CPs already and RIP and/or Savage Roar are going to expire? Yes, or you have the time to FB at 5 CP or simply refresh SR (at 5 CPs) or wait RIP to expire.
Best Glyphs: Savage Roar, Shred, RIP, in every PvE situation.
Best metagem: 21 agi +3% crit damage.
Tier bonus: Use 2T7 (helm, shoulders), then use 2T7 (gloves, legs) +2T8 (helm, shoulders), then use 4T8 (helm, shoulders, gloves, elms).
Idols: As said before the best idol when you gather enough Armor Penetration (or with 4T8) is the shred idol.
How many CPs I should use for SR?: Basically you should have SR always up, so if you have 1 CP and SR expire, use SR with 1 CPs. The number of CPs is important for the wait time of Ferocious Bite, you want to end with usually 2-3 CPs at least when SR expire.
When I should use FB? You want to keep SR up, you want to keep RIP up, then you want to SR. Basically it depends on raid buffs and expecially hit/expertise/crit. For a good geared Feral druid you want about 4-5 sec of SR time, 7-8 sec of RIP time and about 12 second of SR+RIP time. The simulation compute it on the fly and when the addon will be ready it will do it for you.



About Rake vs. Shred
I use to average out trinkets into simulation, so for the sake of true I've runned a simulation with 0% damage reduction for bosses.
Basically if you are geared fully with arpen and equip 1 or 2 arpen trinket, when they proc you are likely to go to negative armor reduction, with negative armor reduction you shouldn't use rake.

I was wondering if anyone else is experiencing issues with some of the FB frames/functionality. Of the 9 functions (in 8 frames in FBN) 5 of the frames are not working for me at all. A more detailed list is in this text quoted from a PM I sent to nightcrowler.

One thing I have not tested yet is turning off my addons but I will do that when I have a little time.

I tried FBN in Ulduar for the first time on tuesday, and by yesterday I had stopped paying attention to it. It seemed to indicate actions that were absurd, like rakes or doing nothing when my roar was timing out, and it had terrible problems properly tracking my roar on first engagement. It would tell me to roar when I had no combo points, and after generating a combo point to roar with the window would go blank before I had actually hit roar.

Additionally, it likes to flash actions and then blank them before I can even come off global to hit the button. Using it on Ignus caused my DPS to fall drastically. I'm using the 3.101 version zip posted on the google code site.

@TheGrog: I agree, to an extent, that the FBN addon isn't realistic in most situations. However, just messing around with it on the Heroic Dummy helped me pick up on a few tweaks to my priority list. I was a big time clipper, because I was always afraid of letting Rip fall off just to throw out an FB. My DPS falls when I use FBN in actual raid situations, but because of it my DPS is actually higher now than it was before using it to tweak my own ability.

@Mijae thanks a lot for those items, I'm used to look at wowhead, hopefully they will update it in a few day and I'll update my list.
@Grog: what you report seems pretty strange, actually the only fights where I have problems are Razorscale (in phase 3 it start to suggest mangle instead of shred) and at Ignis where sometimes it wait too much before using abilities. Razor should be fixed in the next release, Ignis is simply a lag/fps problem not an addon problem.
The problem you described (screen goes blank, SR without CP, etc..) are CPU/Lag problem, try to decrease the update to 0.3-0,4 seconds,

FBN simply suggest your next move in a static environment, it's obvious that sometimes making different choce is a better option, otherwise I'll get a ban from Blizz for automation. Actually I'm using it as a sort of CD frame, I know that I should use an ability when I see it on the screen then I make my choce depending on the environment.

At which point would executioner actually be the choice of weapon enchant ?

From what i could find out the uptime seems to be roughly 40 % - that's 48 ArPen Rating or an equivalent of 158 AP according to nightcrowler's latest simulation with ulduar gear.

Would it be unreasonable for you to generate a 10-man BiS list and calculate what damage the 10-man raiders can expect? Perhaps include BoE 25-man loot but not any of the BoP stuff.